Clocked

Going back in time to old wounds

Still some light breaking through the storm clouds. Photo by me.

I almost clocked the bitch.

I’m not entirely sure what stopped me. In my imagination, in slow motion, my hand turns into a fist. I watch it travel through the air, and strike the side of the face of the mother of a girl on my daughter’s basketball team. It is with enough force that her head jerks to the side. She looks at me in disbelief as she stutters, and stumbles, before falling backward and landing on the ground. Splatted, she pauses, then sullenly touches her face where I struck her, the stark realization that she fucking deserved it sinking in, as she stands up, cowers, and walks away.

I feel electric. I am smug. Satisfied.

This is where the fantasy ends.

Instead, I am brought back into a red-hot reality. I am seething, on one side of the chain-link fence, under the lights, atop asphalt basketball courts, dark clouds surrounding, on this unseasonably chilly late-June evening.

The words I had with this other mother were not worthy of physical harm—she wouldn’t have deserved it. Our exchange was terse, but brief. She did nothing wrong besides dismiss an innocent question I’d asked her in the rudest way possible, complete with turning away, crossed-arms, no eye contact, and a pompous retort.

So, where is my rage coming from? What was it about this encounter that made me want to tear this woman apart? Is this simply a matter of me having anger issues?

I had visions of the headline in the local newspaper had I enacted my fantasy: Community Eye Doctor Assaults Fellow Basketball Mom for Seemingly No Reason.

Tween girls on the court. Photo by me.

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Just before my violent fantasy, our gaggle of parents are all standing there waiting to watch our daughters, who are about to play a three-on-three basketball game.

These are the same parents we’ve been amongst for the last few years, as our girls have moved up through dozens of games in elementary-aged rec leagues, to Middle School Team play, and now this Summer Slam Tournament.

We are cordial. There is minimal group texting. The occasional carpool. But it hasn’t gone further.

I’ve never felt a kinship or camaraderie.

But as my daughter has gotten older, there now seems to be an undercurrent of cliquiness, snobbery, and negativity. Flickers of…hostility?

I’ve chalked it up to it being my fault. I haven’t been overly friendly, or made attempts to bond.

But there is more.

Since my daughter has entered (what I’ve now realized is) competitive middle school play, the games are no longer joyous, the way they were in the rec leagues. There were the occasional tense moments then, but it seemed we all would smile and nod at each other after the games were over, proud of our kids for how hard they played, and how their skills were developing.

Maybe it is just me, but now the stormy energy seems palpable. My husband, a man of few words, when asked, with regard to most of this group of parents, said simply, vibes are off.

Perhaps I should feel lucky we’ve made it to middle school before the tension built. In a lot of children’s sports, the competitiveness seems to begin earlier and earlier, often to the point where even the kids feel, somehow, that age eight is too late to pick up a sport. As if the moment has passed for them to try something new because they didn’t start at age two, and haven’t been involved in travel teams, multiple rec leagues, and on and on…

A friend of mine told me she couldn’t even be on the soccer field when her daughter was six because the other parents made it awful. They were essentially monsters in camp chairs who made constant vitriolic comments to theirs and other children, and injected haughtiness and ego and unfounded grand importance into their six-year-old’s soccer game. I’m beginning to understand what she meant.

Anyway, I digress—I naively thought maybe it was always going to be fun and light-hearted as we moved up the ranks in basketball, that somehow maybe this community was shielded from what seems to be, sadly, the common negative experience of youth sports these days.

These days…I am now under the storm clouds with the cold shoulders of the other parents. I spend an hour nail-biting, twitching in my seat, worried that daughter is going to make a bad play, or it’s going to look like they’re shunning her on the bench. Or see, what I think, are her teammates sneakily laughing behind her back.

Storm. Photo by me.

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After the brief back-and-forth with the other mother, I looked over at my husband to see if he had heard what had just transpired.

He hadn’t. But he could tell something was off with me. He looked like he was bracing for Holly-impact. Uh oh in his eyes.

You see, I haven’t always been so zen. Cue the laughter. Obviously, I’m not winning any awards now either.

As I drag my camp chair far away from these other parents, I’ve realized these games have become increasingly uncomfortable for me. Not only because of the frustration of children’s sports nowadays and the rude fucking parents….

But because of the way my daughter seemed to be treated by her teammates in the last year. The momma bear in me coming out wanting to tell all these middle school bullies where to go…

But even more deeply, I feel like I’M in fucking middle school again, in the company of a bunch of hormonal people without fully-developed brains. Awkward, and unsure of themselves. Full of projections. Jealousy.

And there it is.

I’m…awkward, hormonal, and full of projections. It is me. I’m the problem.

It is not just these other parents.

The reason I’m so angry is because it has brought me back to something most of us have felt: left out, not part of the team, alone.

Like we don’t fit in.

Like I’m still the little girl in the gym, hiding in the corner, getting the dodgeball hurled at her by some self-righteous catholic school kids.

I absorbed their negativity and then it would seep from me. And I felt punished by it.

Now, in adulthood, anytime I make a perceived misstep, even if it isn’t overtly visible, I am left feeling—no surprise, my core wound—shame.

Shame, from feeling like my husband, and basically everyone, myself included, are looking at me with eyes of contempt and disgust.

I don’t want to be perceived like a live-wire, but someone who is calm and has it together.

But I don’t have it together. And maybe I never will. But I can do my best to learn from each and every experience that triggers me, and rewinds me, to these old wounds.

There are going to be times when our edges are frayed and things rub us the wrong way. We are not perfect. We are the living, breathing, walking sum-total of everything that has ever happened to us. Our nervous systems are always looking for patterns to help and trying to help keep us safe.

When I examine what actually did stop me from punching this other mother—is gaining slightly more zen since I’ve stopped drinking and perspective in aging. I understand now that my impulsive, and dare I say, rage-induced behavior in middle, high school and even beyond really didn’t get me anywhere besides being subject to a lot of judgement, side-eye, and regret.

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Another week goes by, and I’m back in my far-away camp chair at my daughter’s last game in this summer’s tournament. This time, the temperature is properly-scorching-July-hot. I’m sweating it out as I still feel the negative energy, but internally I’m much cooler.

As I watch my daughter play, I’m thinking about something she said to me as we joked about how I almost lost it at her last game.

“You’re really making it more than it is, mom…” she laughs, after I ask her if she ever feels left out or shunned, “It’s not that complicated, we’re serious about the game, but we’re really just having fun.”

The parents—mostly me—do complicate things. We project our fears onto our children.

I tell her I’ll try to keep my fists to myself as time goes on.

But if she ever says otherwise…all bets are off.

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May we encourage and see in our children, what the game, and this life, is really all about: don’t be so serious, make others feel included, shed the old wounds, and have fun.

Easier said than done.

I’ll keep playing. Or spectating—sometimes uncomfortably. Remembering that it’s just a game. We’re here to learn a thing or two, hopefully without hurting those around us.

I’m still learning I can’t control how the game is played. I’m trying to release my tight grip. Maybe just hold on lightly. And to know my past doesn’t define me. That impulsivity usually only leads to regrets. To try to put my best foot forward, sans the fighting stance.

We’re all on the same team. We have to do the best with the time we have. It goes so fast.

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Clouds reflect the red-painted desert. Photo by me.